A Library E-Book Can Expire After 26 Loans. Three Places Banned That, and All Three Bans Are Asleep.
Connecticut, Rhode Island and Washington DC have each outlawed expiring library digital licences. Each law switches on only when enough other places do the same, so none is in force — and meanwhile the queue you are standing in is what decides which titles come back.
The Kennedy Center Board Didn't Fight the Judge. It Voted Around Him.
A court ordered Trump's name off the Kennedy Center facade in June. In August, the board voted to close the building for a $250 million renovation — and put the name back on anyway.
What I found when I scanned the brains of kids creating tunes on the piano
Playing improv music activates the reward system of the brain.
The rise of Yemeni coffeehouses in Dearborn and beyond
Yemeni coffeehouses have gained culinary prominence in recent years, offering brews of coffee and tea seasoned with cardamom, ginger, cloves and other ingredients.
Starbucks’ big marketing blunder in South Korea shows how cultural blind spots can put global brands in a bind
Translation is only part of the challenge for multinational companies. Words, slogans and symbols can take on entirely different meanings across cultures.
‘Heartstopper’ is helping LGBTQ+ fans find hope and community across time and space
Stories about young queer people coming of age and finding love have touched people across age and identity, bringing healing after the AIDS crisis and harsh upbringings.
Why Christopher Nolan turned Circe into a vindictive witch
Some critics have bemoaned the flattening of a complex character. But Nolan’s film echoes a literary tradition of reimagining Circe as a survivor, a truth-teller and a figure of female empowerment.
What the panic over Gen Z’s reading habits gets wrong
Despite dire warnings of a ‘postliterate’ generation, data suggests Gen Z is still reading – just in ways many traditional studies fail to capture.
What a western Pennsylvania ’90s-style Pizza Hut reveals about nostalgia
A Carnegie Mellon University marketing researcher explains why the love of a retro Pizza Hut has more to do with the relationships attached to it than pizza.
Trump’s slapdash Reflecting Pool renovations stand in stark contrast to years of deliberation and engineering ingenuity that went into its creation
The construction of the pool reflected a national ambition to build something unifying and enduring. The rushed renovation and political fallout of 2026 reveal how much that civic vision has changed.
‘The Odyssey’ is a striking portrait of the psychological wounds that can emerge when people violate their deepest values
Christopher Nolan turns Homer’s legendary warrior into a case study of moral injury, a condition that often appears in war veterans who struggle to forgive themselves.
Nearly 100 years ago, Philadelphia’s Inez Patterson integrated pools and encouraged other Black girls to swim too
When Patterson was at Temple University, she insisted on swimming when her white teammates swam and not being limited to the hour when the pool was available to Black swimmers.
HOAs are often barriers to sustainable landscaping and solar energy – here’s how they could be bridges instead
Climate change, biodiversity loss and water conservation are often framed as problems in need of national policies. However, there is an often more important level of governance: the neighborhood.
As AI reshapes newsrooms, leading media outlets are charting different paths for its use
From the BBC’s implementation of AI guardrails to Reuters’ embrace of AI tools to disseminate breaking financial news, newsrooms’ missions and values are shaping their technological futures.